Taylor’s 2011 Highlight:The Tour
Taylor Swift was just named CMA Entertainer of the Year for the second time. But as she accepted the award, she credited her fans who supported one of the biggest tours of the year. The final numbers haven’t been announced yet, but they will exceed a million fans.
Country Countdown USA’s Lon Helton asked her what stood out for her from the year: “For me one of the coolest things has been getting to know so many artists I didn’t know before, because I’d make random phone calls and ask if they’d want to sing with me during the show and they actually said yes!” So what percentage of the calls did you make yourself? “Like 100%! You can’t have management reach out. That’s so stupid. It seems so lame, so I’d just get their number or email, because I want them to come to my show, so that’s how it worked out.” Duing the second half of her tour, a wide range of performers showed up, from Justin Bieber to Usher.
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At Taylor’s Nashville show, one of the surprise guests was Kenny Chesney, and Lon asked her how she made that happen: “Kenny & I have known each other a while, so I just shot him an email saying, ‘We’re playing in Nashville, will you please come out and sing a song with me?’ And he goes, ‘Sure, I hope you’re doing great! I love you!’ He’s the best, the sweetest, most friendly, amazing guy, he was nice to me when I was a new artist, and he’s nice to me now. It feels like I’ve got a good friend in Kenny Chesney. He was so sweet to come out and sing Big Star with me, I love that song, that’s my favorite song he’s ever done.”
Another guest on the Nashville show was longtime friend Tim McGraw. “We were sitting on a couch that got raised on an elevator lift. The minute the audience saw Tim, it was the loudest, most chaotic scream I’d ever heard. Everybody was starstruck. I’m always starstruck around Tim McGraw.” Did Tim bring the family? “Yes, Faith and the girls were there. They’ve been two of the most supportive people of me. There has not been one birthday Faith forgets. If I get sick, she sends cookies. It’s amazing how they’ve been to me as a family.”
Taylor had big goals when she started this tour, but now as it’s ending, did it live up to her expectations? Yes, it beat my expectations. I didn’t think I could fit all my ideas into one show. Before the tour began, I sat down with my stage designers, and said I wanted each song to have it’s own crazy thing about it. They looked at my notes and said they could do all of it. Everything I wanted to do and more got put into that show. So many unexpected moments in the show and that’s my favorite thing.”
Did some things change during the year? “I added in different acoustic moments. At the beginning of the tour, I wan’t doing cover songs every night. That’s a fun moment in the show. And lately at the end of the show, I’ve been playing a song acoustic, just me and a guitar, and it’s a song called ‘Ours,’ that I really love. That’s something new that came from fan requests.”
Category: Audio
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